The development of the Cold War after World War II and America’s ascension to a position as the leading World power with its attendant dangers and complications led to somewhat of a removal of partisan politics from foreign policy issues. Underlying this move, referred to as bi-partisanship, was the idea that the President and Executive Branch agencies would work with Congress to develop foreign policies that could receive support from Republicans and Democrats alike. Republican Senator Arthur Vandenberg was perhaps the key proponent of bipartisanship. He famously asserted that “politics stops at the water’s edge.”

During the period from 1945 to 1949, bipartisanship in foreign policy reached a high point, although partisan politics did intrude. Among the bipartisan successes are U.S. membership in the United Nations, implementation of the Marshall Plan for European recovery, and the creation of NATO. The death of Vandenberg, the rise of McCarthyism, the controversy over the “loss” of China, disagreement over the handling of the war in Korea, and unilateral foreign policy actions by the Truman Administration all led to a rise in partisanship in foreign policy during Harry Truman’s second term in office. Even though the bi-partisan consensus broke down, there was continued paying of lip-service to the idea, but by the 1952 presidential election, the idea of bi-partisanship had itself taken on a partisan taint.

On February 12, 1953, at one of the first meetings of Republican President Dwight Eisenhower’s Cabinet, Henry Cabot Lodge, the new U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, raised the issue of bipartisanship. He noted Senator Vandenberg’s distinction between Congressional matters and Executive action. There was comment that Democratic leaders practiced bipartisanship only for matters involving Congress. At the end of the discussion, Secretary of Defense Charles Wilson requested preparation of a memorandum on the subject of bipartisanship “to clarify the practice for all Cabinet Members” and responsibility for that was placed on Secretary of State John Foster Dulles. Subsequent to the meeting, Dulles and Lodge discussed the issue with the end result that on February 23, Lodge sent the Secretary of State a “Dear Foster” note enclosing the following memorandum on “Bi-Partisanship in Executive-Congressional Relations”.

Dulles acknowledged receipt of Lodge’s memorandum and then distributed it to the entire Cabinet under cover of a letter he personally drafted. The following is the letter to Attorney General Herbert Brownell, Jr.:

Identical letters went to the following officials:

Secretary of the Treasury George M. Humphrey

Secretary of Defense Charles Wilson

Postmaster General Arthur E. Summerfield

Secretary of Agriculture Ezra Taft Benson

Secretary of Commerce Sinclair Weeks

Secretary of the Interior Douglas McKay

Secretary of Labor Martin Durkin

Director of Mutual Security Harold E. Stassen

Federal Security Administrator Oveta Culp Hobby

Sources: Documentation on the meeting of the Cabinet is found in Cabinet Meeting of February 12, 1953; Box 1; Cabinet Series, Dwight D. Eisenhower Papers as President; Dwight D. Eisenhower Presidential Library. The Lodge note to Dulles and enclosed memorandum, Dulles’s acknowledgement, and Dulles’s referrals to the Cabinet are under file 711.2/2-2353, 1950-54 Central Decimal File, RG 59: General Records of the Department of State, National Archives. I thank my colleagues Karl Weissenbach and Valoise Armstrong at the Eisenhower Library for their assistance.

In recent years, the subject of leaks of classified information from U.S. Government agencies has received a great deal of attention. This is not a new problem; I have seen references to such leaks as early as World War I. In the early 1960s, however, the Department of State suffered a spate of leaks. The problem was significant enough that President John F. Kennedy discussed the matter with Under Secretary of State George W. Ball (the Department’s #2 official). In response, the Under Secretary personally prepared the following memorandum to the President discussing how to deal with the issue.

Along with the memo, Ball sent an 8-page outline of the proposed seminar (best copy available).

The problem of leaks has never gone away. Attempts by the Nixon Administration to deal with that issue led to some of the Watergate-era abuses.

Source: Under Secretary of State George W. Ball to President John F. Kennedy, November 8, 1963, file PR 11, 1963 Subject-Numeric File (NAID 590618), RG 59: General Records of the Department of State, National Archives.

As the Department of State noted in a major 1950 publication “There is no longer any real distinction between ‘domestic’ and ‘foreign’ affairs.” (Our Foreign Policy, Department of State Publication 3972, released September 1950). In the post-World War II Twentieth Century, perhaps no issue better illustrates that statement than the movement for civil rights in the U.S.

In two eloquent letters, the first in 1946 and the second in 1952, the Department of State explained how discrimination within the United States presented an obstacle to America’s foreign policy goals.

The first letter came in response to an informal April 1946, request from Malcolm Ross, chairman of the President’s Committee of Fair Employment Practice. The Committee was preparing the final report on its activities during World War II and making recommendations on post-war governmental policy relating to industry discrimination “because of race, creed, color, or national origin.” Ross noted that the report planned to note in a general way that domestic discrimination affected U.S. international affairs and suggested that the Department “might wish to make a statement in support of the thesis that the existence of racial discrimination is a handicap and that Government should take thought how best to eliminate it.”

In response, the Department sent the following letter signed by Acting Secretary of State Dean Acheson. The letter was later featured in To Secure These Rights, the 1947 final report of the President’s Committee on Civil Rights, and in legal briefs prepared by the Department of Justice in a number of cases.

Malcolm Ross to Under Secretary of State Dean Acheson, April 3, 1946, Acting Secretary of State Dean Acheson to Malcolm Ross, May 8, 1946, file 811.504/11-1352, 1945-49, Central Decimal File, 1910-1963 (NAID 302021) Record Group 59: General Records of the Department of State.

The second letter resulted from a November 1952, request by Attorney General James McGranery to now-Secretary of State Acheson. McGranery explained that the Department of Justice was preparing an amicus curiae brief to file with the Supreme Court in several of the cases leading up to the decision on segregation in public schools in Brown v. Board of Education. The Attorney General noted that the brief “would be immeasurably enhanced” if it contained an “authoritative statement” of the impact of domestic racial discrimination on U.S. foreign relations. Quoting from Acheson’s earlier letter, McGranery explained that a letter describing the situation as it stood in 1952 “would be of inestimable value in affording the Court a better appreciation of the broader international implications of the question presented in these cases.”

In response, the Department sent the following letter.

Attorney General James McGranery to Secretary of State Dean Acheson, November 13, 1952, Secretary of State Dean Acheson to Attorney General James McGranery, file 811.411/11-1352, 1950-54, Central Decimal File, 1910-1963 (NAID 302021) Record Group 59: General Records of the Department of State.

As the leading biographer of Dean Acheson notes, however, despite the eloquence of the letters, the Department of State did little to contest domestic racist practices nor did the U.S. as a matter of its foreign policy do so overseas. Later in life, Acheson was a supporter of white power regimes in Africa and made overtly racist statements (Robert L. Beisner, Dean Acheson: A Life in the Cold War). Nevertheless, the letters remain accurate statements of the impact of domestic discrimination on U.S. foreign policy.

Today’s post was written by Dr. Greg Bradsher, archivist at the National Archives in College Park.

At the end of January, Lt. Gen. Omar N. Bradley, head of the 12th Army Group, wrote the G-5s of his four Armies (First, Third, Ninth, and Fifteenth) regarding the Monuments, Fine Arts and Archives (MFA&A) Specialist Officers and their activities. He noted that as a measure contributing to the eventual restitution of works of art and objects of a scientific or historical importance which may have been looted from United Nations governments or nationals, the MFA&A officers would investigate all information of such nature and inspect all repositories of such works falling within the area of the command to which they were assigned or attached, and report their findings. Of course, in late January, the Monuments Men were not, with the exception of the Aachen area, in a physical position to seek out looted cultural property, nor German cultural treasures that had been evacuated eastward for protection.

But during February 1945, as the Allied forces pushed further east, the MFA&A officers had greater opportunity to seek out information about the location of German and looted cultural treasures. By that time they already knew, based on information from MFA&A officers who entered Germany in the latter part of 1944 and the first months of 1945, that they had many challenges ahead, given the large, and increasing, number of repositories containing loot and German-owned cultural property, which were being identified. Information was being obtained from German museum personnel, from British and American sources in Paris, and from prisoner of war interrogations.

During February Capt. Walter J. Huchthausen, MFA&A officer with the Ninth U.S. Army obtained a German report, dated December 9, 1943, on a meeting of Rheinprovinz officials, October 22, 1943, the purpose of which was to discuss measures pertaining to disposition of art collections. The report provided information on thirty repositories. One was at Ehrenbreitstein Fortress on the mountain of the same name on the east bank of the Rhine opposite the town of Koblenz, where art treasures from Cologne, Dusseldorf, and Koblenz were kept in tunnels and where the building of another tunnel had been authorized for storing more art objects. Another place identified was the salt mine at Kochendorf, near Heilbronn, which purportedly held art objects from many places. In Aachen he found a group of papers that identified 10 repositories, including Kochendorf. He reported that there was much correspondence regarding Kochendorf being an ideal art repository because of its depth (150 meters) and dry conditions. From interrogations of Germans Huchthausen also learned about a repository at Siegen, east of Cologne, in south Westphalia.

Based upon the information that the MFA&A officers and other Allied personnel were obtaining about repositories, SHAEF (Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force) on February 11 issued its first listing of German repositories holding loot and German-owned property. The list included a repository at Siegen, which was reported to contain 104 paintings and 48 pieces of sculpture from Aachen and also the Cathedral Treasure from Metz which had been sent there on August 30, 1944. The list also included a storage location somewhere in Bad Wildungen (some 35 miles northeast of Marburg) and the salt mines at Heilbronn and Kochendorf.

While Huchthausen and other MFA&A officers attached to the Armies under the 12th Army Group were trying to pinpoint the location of repositories, Capt. Marvin C. Ross, USMCR, with MFA&A, G-5 Operations Branch, SHAEF, during mid-February visited 12th Army Group and the four armies under it to discuss intelligence on repositories of works of art and to coordinate the information obtained. This information would be incorporated into the next issue of the SHAEF listing of repositories, issued on March 11.

At the end of February, Lt. George Stout, USNR, MFA&A office at the 12th Army Group produced a listing of additional repositories and had it provided to SHAEF. In his listings, Stout noted that the Siegen mine and its vicinity were said to be used as repositories for work of art.

The Siegen copper mine, some 60 miles southeast of Cologne, had first come to the attention of the MFA&A officers in late 1944. Capt. Robert K. Posey, with the Third U. S. Army, had issued a report, dated December 29, 1944, indicating that the Metz Cathedral treasures were at Seigen [Siegen] in Germany. Upon reading this Ross wrote Stout at 12th Army Group that he could not find any trace of a Seigen [Siegen] in his Gazetteer and asked him to check with Posey about his information. Two days later Ross again wrote Stout, indicating that Lt. Col. Geoffrey Webb, Adviser, MFA&A, G-5 Operations Branch, SHAEF, had straightened him out about the place where the repository was—Siegen—Posey had the letters transposed. It is interesting to note that the Office of Strategic Services reported on January 1 that it was probable that part of the Treasury of Aachen Cathedral had been taken to “Singen in Westphalia, a town not otherwise known.”

It would not be until spring that the MFA&A officers would finally get to Siegen and discover what art works and other cultural property it contained. In the meantime, during February and March, they would continue gathering information about the location of repositories and their contents. Of course, they would continue with their mission of protecting cultural property. As will be noted in future blog postings, two of them would be killed in action trying to save German cultural treasures.

Today’s post was written by Dr. Greg Bradsher, archivist at the National Archives in College Park.

In mid-September 1944 General Henry H. ( “Hap”) Arnold, commander of the U.S. Army Air Force, proposed that every available British and American airplane be used on some clear day to swarm all over the German Reich, attacking military objectives in towns that had hitherto been unmolested by the air forces. This type of operation, he felt, would afford the Germans an opportunity to witness at firsthand the might of the Allies and to reflect on their own helplessness. But clear days that opened up the entire expanse of Germany to such a venture were rarities, especially during the autumn, and during the winter the Allied air forces were tied up, in part, with the German counter-offense in the Ardennes, and, in part, giving first priority to attacking German oil targets.

By the middle of February the several Allied land armies were prepared to resume the offensive toward the Rhine which the Germans had interrupted in December. The Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force (SHAEF) requested the air forces to utilize all available Anglo-American air power in a blow at German rail and water transportation facilities which would result in an immediate disruption of the German lines of communication and transportation system in general, and that the impact would be of direct and immediate benefit to the ground forces. SHAEF desired British-American bombers and fighters to range over most of Germany simultaneously on a clear day to attack all sorts of transportation targets: grade crossings, stations, barges, docks, signals, tracks, bridges, and marshalling yards. Most of the objectives were located in small towns that had never been bombed before. Hence they would not be well defended and injury to Germany’s economy might, at its best, produce a demoralizing effect on the Germans, and perhaps the precipitation of a crisis among railroad personnel, on the eve of the land offensive. Lt. Gen. Carl Spaatz, commander of U.S. Strategic Air Forces in Europe, agreed to the concept and the Allied air planners developed a plan to implement SHAEF’s desires. Each of the Allied air commands which participated was given an area for attack, secondary targets and targets of opportunity to be chosen in the same general area as the primaries if the latter could not be seen. The operation was code-named “Clarion.”

The opportunity to launch Operation Clarion came on February 22, when most of Germany was expected to be vulnerable to visual-bombing attacks. The tactical air forces received assignments in western and northwestern Germany. The Fifteenth Air Force, based in Italy, was to operate over a wide area in southern Germany, Royal Air Force (RAF) Bomber Command retained its semi-monopoly over the Ruhr, and the Eighth Air Force planned to bomb several dozen towns in the middle and north central part of Germany. The Eighth Air Force had to depart from its usual operating procedures in several respects. Most important of all, the heavy bombers were to attack from about 10,000feet or even lower instead of the customary 20,000-25,000-foot altitudes. Also, they were to form small attacking units instead of organizing into the usual large formations. All the Eighth’s fighters were to go along, mainly for independent strafing and bombing operations.

On February 22 the Eight Air Force effectively sortied 1,372 bombers (B-17s and B-24s) and 677 Fighter escorts. These bombers would drop 3,895.1 tons on assigned targets and numerous targets of opportunity. Eighty-five of the bombers sustained battle damage from flak, which was not surprising in view of the low bombing altitudes. Luftwaffe (the German Air Force) opposition to the bombers was very meager, with only one bomber being lost in air action, a straggler shot down by a Me-262. The escorting fighters engaged more than 25 Fw-190s and a few Me-109s southwest of Bremen; six Me-262s in Stetting area; more than 12 Me-262s in Stendal-Brandenburg area; one Me-262 southeast of Salzwede; four Me-262s in the vicinity of Stendal; 15 Me-262s southwest of Berlin; and two Me-262s south of Helmstedt. The escorting fighters claimed to have downed two Me-262s and the fighters engaged in fighter sweeps claimed two Me-262s. The hardest hit targets during the day were Ansbach (420 tons); Ulm (232.5 tons); Wittenberge (216 tons); Stendal (over 214 tons); Ulzen (over 214 tons); Salzwedel (over 197 tons); and the marshalling yards at Bamberg (187 tons), Hildesheim (over 148 tons), Peine (over 142 tons), Ludwigslust (over 136 tons), Kreinsen (over 131 tons), Northeim (over 124 tons), Luneburg (over 115 tons), and, Halberstadt (over 113 tons). Those targets receiving 20 to 99 tons were marshalling yards at Aalen, Gottingen, Celle, Ottergen, Neustadt, Nordhausen, Singen, Schwenningen, Eschwege, Villingen, Wallhausen;and cities of Donaueschingen, Reutlingen, Freiburg, Hafingen,Wittstock, Grabow, Kobbelitz, Dannenberg, Klotze, Sangerhausen, and, Vienenburg. Those targets bombed with less than 20 tons were the marshalling yards at Kitzingen, Oker, and, Zwickau.

The escorting fighters attacked targets on the ground, claiming to have destroyed or damaged 44 German aircraft, 104 locomotives, 22 oil tank cars, and 232 railcars. Meanwhile two groups of P-51s making fighter sweeps claimed to have destroyed or damaged 31 locomotive and 74 railcars.

The Fifteenth Air Force sortied 231 B-17s and 543 B-24s, escorted by 99 P-38s and 201 P-51s, against communication targets in an area 300 miles long and 100 miles wide in southwest Germany. They would bomb 32 marshalling yards and staffing attacks after the bombing, destroyed or damaged 110 locomotives, 40 oil tank cars, and 300 railroad cars. Also on February 22 the Ninth Air Force sortied 465 bombers and 1,053 fighters as part of the attack on transportation targets. The Ninth Bomb Division attacked 44 railroad bridges, rail sidings, rail junctions, and, eleven marshalling yards, dropping 850 tons. The Ninth Tactical Air Command dropped 136 tons on rail targets, carried out in the Giessen-Freiburg area. The Nineteenth Tactical Air Command dropped 79 tons on numerous rail targets and strafed rail traffic in the Bingen area. And the Twenty Ninth Tactical Air Command dropped 161 tons on rail targets in the Dusseldorf-Cologne area. The Ninth Air Force claimed to have destroyed or damaged 183 motor vehicles, 28 armored vehicles and tanks, 118 locomotives, 1,407 railroad cars; damaged 3 bridges; and, made 185 rail cuts. During the day the Ninth Air Force aircraft claimed shooting down 17 German aircraft in the air, while losing three bombers and 12 fighters.

During February 22 the First Tactical Air Command sortied 171 bombers and 782 fighters and fighter bombers to attack rail targets in northwest and western Germany. During the day, while losing 8 bombers and 2 fighters, they claimed to have destroyed at least 9 German aircraft in the air and destroyed or damaged 38 locomotives, 536 railroad cars, ten bridges, as well as making 170 rail cuts. Also during the day the RAF Second Tactical Air Command sortied nearly 1,700 aircraft to attack marshalling yards, railroad stations, and rail traffic in northwest Germany. They would lose 21 Mosquitoes (de Havilland DH.98) and 12 fighters, while claiming to have shot down six German aircraft, and destroying or damaging 252 motor vehicles, 166 locomotives, 877 railroad cars, 94 barges, as well as making 110 rail cuts.

On February 22, thirty-four RAF Lancasters, escorted by 115 P-51s, bombed the railway viaducts at Altenbeken and Bielefeld, without losing any aircraft. Also during the day, 85 Lancasters, escorted by 49 Spitfires, while losing one aircraft, dropped over 383 tons on the town area and a Benzol plant at Gelsenkirchen. Seventy-five RAF Lancasters, escorted by 48 Spitfires and P-51s, suffered no losses and dropped over 333 tons on the Benzol plant at Osterfeld.

This first Clarion operation was judged so successful that a repeat was ordered for February 23, though on a smaller scale. On that date the Eight Air Force effectively sortied 1,211 bombers and 492 Fighter escorts to attack rail centers in central Germany. While encountering almost no Luftwaffe opposition, they dropped 3,316.4 tons on assigned targets and numerous targets of opportunity. More than 110 tons were dropped on each of eight marshalling yards (Treuchtlin, Crailsheim, Neumarkt, Ansback, Kitzingen, Weimar, Gera, and Plauen. Also heavily bombed were Nordlingem, Schwabisch Hall, Winterhausen, Meiningen, Adelsberg, Hildburghausen, Lichtenfels, Schweinfurt, Ellingen, Ottingen, Wurzburg, Crailsheim, Jena, Osnabruck, Schluchter, Fritzler, Reichenbach, Steinau, and Paderborn, and the marshalling yards at Fulda and the railroad bridge at Kitzingen. Only two bombers failed to return to base, one ditching in the North Sea and the other having its crew parachuted safely in friendly territory. During the day the escorting P-51s claimed to have shot down seven German planes with the loss of one plane to Flak. The Fighter escorts also claimed to have destroyed or damaged 31 locomotives, 141 railroad cars, and 17 oil tank cars. Also during the day, three groups of fighters made sweeps, strafing airfields at Neuburg, Landsburg and Leipheim, rail and road traffic near Augsburg and near Frankfort. While losing one P-51 while strafing they claimed to have destroyed or damaged 23 German aircraft on the ground, 17 locomotives, 58 railroad cars, and 16 oil tank cars. And in a special operation, twenty-four B-24s dropped nearly 60 tons on the marshalling yards at Neuss.

On February 23 the Ninth Air Force sortied over 2,300 medium bombers, fighters and fighter bombers. The Ninth Bomb Division dropped nearly 600 ton on communication centers in western Germany. The Ninth Tactical Air Command conducted armed reconnaissance north and south of Stockheim and north of Duren and provided air cooperation to ground forces. The Nineteenth Tactical Air Command provided armed reconnaissance in Cologne, Trier, Bonn, Mannheim, and Homburg areas. The Twenty-Ninth Tactical Air Command provided armed reconnaissance in Venlo area and provided air cooperation to ground forces. They claimed to have destroyed or damaged six German aircraft in the air, 123 locomotives, 3,027 railroad cars, 1,317 motor vehicles, 305 armored fighting vehicles, 9 bridges, 20 barges, as well as making 115 rail cuts. During the day the First Tactical Air Command sortied over 905 aircraft to make fighter sweeps, armed reconnaissance, rail interdiction, and to attack bridges, fuel dumps, and gun positions in western Germany. During the day they claimed to have destroyed or damaged 17 German aircraft in the air, as well as destroying or damaging 7 locomotives, 323 railroad cars, as well as making 67 rail cuts. The RAF Second Tactical Air Command sortied 179 aircraft to make armed reconnaissance in Dulmen, Paderborn, Cologne, Duren, Munster areas and to attack railroad bridges and ammunition depots.

During the day 324 RAF bombers, escorted by 119 Spitfires and P-51s, while suffering the lost of one Halifax bomber, dropped over 1,170 tons on Essen and 130 Lancasters, escorted by 33 Spitfires, while suffering no losses, dropped nearly 580 tons on the Benzol plant at Gelsenkirchen. The Fifteenth Air Force sent 455 heavy bombers to attack eight transportation targets in southern Germany.

Two days of Operation Clarion, which saw bombing accuracy unexpectedly high and losses slight, resulted in the Allied air forces demonstrating for the Germans ample evidence of Allied air power and its control of the skies. The German transportation system was dealt a heavy blow. Yet, it appears the rail traffic throughout the area affected had been radically reduced for only three days and that the attacks had not prevented the Germans from continuing the movement of high priority traffic. The Joint Intelligence Committee (JIC) concluded that the Clarion Operation had not seriously affected Germany’s capacity to resist, and Air Marshal Charles Portal, RAF Chief of Staff, in indorsing this opinion, advised against any further attempts with this type of operation. Spaatz; Air Marshal Sir Arthur Tedder, the Deputy Supreme Commander at SHAEF; and Lt. Gen. James Doolittle, commander of the Eight Air Force, were inclined to disagree with the JIC conclusion, but they launched no further Clarion operations.

Sources:

Transportation Division, United States Strategic Bombing Survey, The Effects of Strategic Bombing on German Transportation, November 20, 1945, pp. 15, 16, File: 200 The Effects of Strategic Bombing on German Transportation (Final Report), European Survey Published Reports and Supporting Records, 1937-1945 (Entry I-10 6, NAID 560340), Records of the U.S. Strategic Bombing Survey, RG 243.

Military Analysis Division, U.S. Strategic Bombing Survey, The Impact of the Allied Air Effort on German Logistics, Second Edition, January 1947, p. 60, File: 64A The Impact of the Allied Air Effort on German Logistics (Final Report), European Survey Published Reports and Supporting Records, 1937-1945 (Entry I-10 6, NAID 560340), Records of the U.S. Strategic Bombing Survey, RG 243.

Wesley Frank Craven and James Lea Gate, eds., The Army Air Forces in World War II; Volume Three, Europe: Argument to V-E Day January 1944 to May 1945 (Washington, D.C.: Office of Air Force History), pp. 639, 732-735, 761-762.

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